


All I Want for Christmas

by MorganOfTheFey



Series: OTP: Bats and Butterflies [1]
Category: Fallout 4
Genre: Angst, Christmas songs, Drinking, F/M, Mariah Carey, Self-Worth Issues, drunk on Christmas, lotta angst in this one kids, my Sole's name is Anna, self-hate, yes it's THAT song
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-20
Updated: 2016-01-20
Packaged: 2018-05-15 02:49:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,131
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5768491
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MorganOfTheFey/pseuds/MorganOfTheFey
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Deacon drinks alone on Christmas and convinces himself it will be fun to record a drunken rendition of Mariah Carey's "All I Want for Christmas is You" for Anna, which actually sounds really fucking sad with enough whiskey and self-loathing.</p>
            </blockquote>





	All I Want for Christmas

**Author's Note:**

> so there's some larger context at work in this story, in that Deacon has just been informed by Desdemona that Anna's missing son is actually the leader of the Institute, and as the person Anna trusts the most, it's now his mission to sell her out to them to get back the Railroad agents that were captured when the Institute hit the Switchboard. 
> 
> I'll write out this full story eventually, but for now, have a quick one shot of Deacon angst!

The post-fallout world didn't know what it was missing out with Mariah Carey. Deacon took another drink of whiskey and reclined back on his bed. His bed, his very own bed. No first-come-first-serve mattresses on the floor like at HQ. Here in Sanctuary, he had his very own bed inside his very own room. Sure, Preston and MacCready lived in the house with him, and Hancock crashed on the couch when he popped up here from Goodneighbor, but this was still the most privacy he'd had in ... longer than he cared to remember.

_Baby, all I want for Christmas is youuuuuu~_

The happy beat started with the piano coming in and Deacon grinned. Yep, no idea what they were fucking missing. Good thing Nate saved all this music or the world might have been bereft forever. Damn good thing Anna knew how to repair shit, fixing up radios and power armor and broken down people. Deacon kept drinking, his sunglasses dimming the already dark room as the sun started going down. He knew how to have fun on his own.

Deacon could sing a damn sight better than MacCready too. Singing Christmas songs on his own. What did they call that pre-war? ... _caroling_ , that's right, caroling. He was caroling in his own room, getting drunk alone in the dark, where he couldn't bother anyone. God, he was having so much fun. Deacon took another heavy swig. His best lies were always to himself. And speaking of which, he was having so much fucking fun singing along to Mariah Carey, it was almost too bad no one could hear him. He was such a good singer, he should record this shit. Anna always liked it when he sang while they traveled, even if the noise did attract the occasional feral or mirelurk. 

Yeah, record this. That's what he should do. Deacon finished off the last of the bottle and it sounded like an even better idea. He wasn't fit for company tonight, didn't deserve to be around his butterfly—she thought he was the butterfly, but he wasn't, he was the bat watching her from the shadows. Always watching her, always following two steps behind. She was the real butterfly, and she didn't deserve to put up with his shit tonight. God knew she had enough of her own sorrows without him heaping his tragedies on her back. 

But! But he could sing a nice song for her, a happy one to make her smile. He was the best at making her smile, mostly because he was the best at recognizing when she did it. Her humor was so dry, it was hard to tell when she was serious or sarcastic, but her eyes were her tell. They lit up when she was joking or liked one of his jokes, even if the lower half of her face didn't respond. But when she did smile ... 

Deacon would do anything to make that happen. 

He stumbled his way over to the radio and took out the tape. That's what it was called, right? A cassie tape? Or ... cadet? No, that was something military. It was some kind of tape, so old it was even pre-pre-war. Anna had hinted at how oppressive the government became during her generation, and the only reason old tapes like these survived the ban was because no one had the tech to play them. But Anna fixed up this radio for him that could play a tape on one side and record on the other. She fixed ones for Danse and Nick too, but _his_ radio was special. It meant more when she made his, the others didn't matter as much. 

Right, so lying to himself and attempting to drunkenly record a Christmas song. 

“I don't want a lot for Christmas, there is just one thing I need ...”

The tape couldn't play and record at the same time, so there was no drum beat or piano this time, just Deacon loudly slurring out the lyrics in a manner that might pass for singing. But it was the thought that counted, right?

“I don't care about the presents underneath the Christmas tree ...”

Maybe she'd smile when she heard this. He didn't have a Christmas present for her. What the fuck could he get her? He didn't exactly get a paycheck working for the Railroad, and he spent whatever he made hustling on mission-related expenses anyway. Clothing changes and traveling across the Commonwealth didn't come cheap. 

“There is just one thing I want, more than you can ever know ...”

Anna would smile the way she only did for him and hum along. She liked that he knew so much about pre-war culture and understood her jokes about half the time. He liked her deadpan snarky remarks and that she never pressed him for information. She accepted whatever he told her about himself, and if it turned out to be a lie, she shrugged it off.

“Make my dreams come true ...”

_It doesn't matter_ , she told him. _You're mine now_. 

Hers. She hadn't specified her what. Just … hers. And Deacon was—every lying, defective part him. Anna didn't know his eye color, but she'd still claimed him as hers. She didn't know the truth about his past, and she still brought him into her home. She trusted him, and he was going to betray her.

“Baby—” Deacon's voice cracked. When had he started crying? “All I want for Christmas …”

She was everything good in the world, and he was everything wrong with the fucking Commonwealth. And he was still going to sell her out.

“Is …” Deacon gasped the word, and then his voice gave over to sobbing completely.

****

***

The next morning Deacon found his sunglasses lying on the floor next to his face and his right arm completely numb beneath his chest from sleeping on top of it. Thank god for being ambidextrous and thank god for his shades covering up yet another bad hangover. Now if only he could figure out a way to incorporate earplugs into his disguises. Were Preston and Danse holding some sort of military parade with bass drums or was that just his heartbeat?

Then he noticed the radio with the tape recorder and— _cassette_ , they were fucking called cassette tapes. One was still inside, and when he rewound it back and played it again, he got to listen to himself drunk-singing Mariah Carey's “All I Want for Christmas is You.” Halfway through, it turned into drunk-crying-singing, and the whole pathetic mess ended in sobbing and a series of _Anna_ and _please_ and _I'm so sorry_ , and Deacon smashed that little fucker with the bottom of the bedside lamp until the plastic casing gave a satisfying crack.

Too bad he couldn't do the same for his feelings.

**Author's Note:**

> so if anyone likes where this is going (ie, wants to hurt more), please let me know! I'm working on drafting what's probably going to be a super long fic about Deacon and Anna, and I'd love to hear your headcanons and requests <3
> 
> oh, and in theatre, the "butterflies" are the actors who get to be on stage and the "bats" are the backstage workers who do the set, lighting, costumes, etc etc that makes the show work.


End file.
